AmigaOS C development

Cross-compilation on x64 Linux >> m68k AmigaOS.



AmigaOS C program source-code.

Executing cross-compiled window program on AmigaOS.

 

Continuous Integration and Deployment

Continuous Integration is the practice of constantly merging development work with a Master/Trunk/Mainline branch so that you can test changes and test that those changes work with other changes. The idea here is to test your code as often as possible so you can catch issues early on. In the continuous integration process, most of the work is done by an automated tests technique which requires a unit test framework. It is best practice to have a build server designed specifically for performing these tests so your development team can continue merging requests even while tests are being performed...

Yes, automation here is key.

...Continuous Delivery is the continual delivery of code to an environment once the developer feels the code is ready to ship - this could be UAT (User Acceptance Testing), staging or production. The idea behind continuous delivery is that you’re constantly delivering code to a user base, whether it be QA or directly to customers for continual review and inspection. Although similar to continuous integration, continuous delivery differs because it can feed business logic tests where unit tests are unable to catch all business logic, particularly design issues.

...Continuous Deployment is the deployment or release of code to production as soon as it’s ready. There is no large batching in staging nor a long UAT (User Acceptance Testing) process before production. Any testing is done prior to merging to the Mainline branch and is performed on production-like environments. The production branch is always stable and ready to be deployed by an automated process. The automated process is key because it should be able to be performed by anyone in a matter of minutes (preferably by the press of a button).

And after all that, log-auditing after deployment; checking key metrics if they are influenced negatively or positively by change(s).

In the ideal workflow, the entire process could be automated from start to finish:

• Step 1: Developer checks in code to development branch.
  
• Step 2: Continuous integration server picks up the change, merges it with Master/Trunk/Mainline, performs unit tests and votes on the merge to staging environment based on test results.
  
• Step 3. If Step 2 is successful, developer deploys it to the staging environment and QA tests the environment.
  
• Step 4. If Step 3 passed, you vote to move to production and the continuous integration server picks this up again and determines if it’s ok to merge into production.
  
• Step 5. If Step 4 is successful, it will deploy to production environment. 

This process varies slightly based on needs, requirements and approaches.

DevOps + Development

DevOps is not easy.

As software transitions from a monolithic to a microservice architecture, organizations are adopting DevOps practices to accelerate delivery of features to customers and improve their experience.

Jumping into continuous testing without the right infrastructure, tools, and processes can be a disaster.

Continuous testing plays an important role to achieve the fastest quality to market. Continuous testing requires several levels of monitoring with automated triggers, collaboration, and actions. Here’s what is required:

• Automatic Test Triggers to execute tests as software transitions from various stages – development / test / staging / production
• Service Health Monitoring to automate feedback on failures
• Test Result Monitoring to automate feedback on failures
• Identifying Root Cause of Failure and analyzing test results

As one can imagine this takes a hell of a toll on DevOps-personnel.

It is one of the most challenging fields today. Simply because it requires a deep understanding of the right principles, processes and practices that the DevOps philosophy is bringing to the IT world.

Because that is what it is: a philosophy.

Cloud Engineer + DevOps

A cloud engineer is an IT professional responsible for any technological duties associated with cloud computing, including design, planning, management, maintenance and support.

The cloud engineer position can be broken into multiple roles, including cloud architect, cloud software engineer, cloud security engineer, cloud systems engineer and cloud network engineer.

Each position focuses on a specific type of cloud computing, rather than the technology as a whole. Companies that hire cloud engineers are often looking to deploy cloud services or further their cloud understanding and technology.

https://aws.amazon.com/what-is-cloud-computing/

---

DevOps is the combination of cultural philosophies, practices, and tools that increases an organization’s ability to deliver applications and services at high velocity: evolving and improving products at a faster pace than organizations using traditional software development and infrastructure management processes. This speed enables organizations to better serve their customers and compete more effectively in the market.

https://aws.amazon.com/devops/what-is-devops/

---

From my employer's website [edit/red.]:

 Robots and artificial intelligence create opportunities of enormous dimensions. 

 We have developed the market-leading virtual assistant, who has taken the European market by storm. The company is experiencing rapid growth and we are looking for new colleagues to join us at our office in Stavanger, Norway. Become a part of what the World Economic Forum calls "The Fourth Industrial Revolution"! 

 As an employee in our company, you become a part of a young and dynamic environment with a high degree of freedom for self-development. Your colleagues have exceptional expertise in data and technology, and all developers get access to state of the art equipment. 

 Our technology stack today consists of Linux, PostgreSQL, Apache, Varnish, Java, Spring, Grails, Groovy, Gradle, Python, Javascript, Lua, Torch, IntelliJ IDEA, Git and Amazon Web Services (hence the aws-amazon links above). We will use any required additional technologies in the future to solve whatever new challenges may arise. 

--// Samsung Nexus S \\--

My next tech-upgrade, is the cutting edge smart-phone Samsung Nexus S.

As a collaboration between Samsung and Google, it's the next-step innovation in smart-phone technology.

My first Android-phone was the developer-phone HTC Magic ( non-Google branded B-revision ). It was a barebones Android-system without any major UI additions like HTCs newer Desire-models  (Sense UI).

From what I can gather, Nexus S is like the previous Nexus phone with updated components and firmware. Pretty much an updated developer-phone for Google's latest Android-platform: v2.3 "Gingerbread".

With an up-2-date CPU of 1GHz, codenamed "Hummingbird" ( ARM Cortex A8 ), the Nexus S is multitask-capable. Making it the most powerful Android-phone at the moment. The ARM Cortex A8 chip includes a co-processor: the PowerVR SGX 450 GPU for OpenGL ES 1.1/2.0 for enhanced 2D/3D mobile graphics and animation.

As a superuser, my previous phones have all lacked enough memory-capacity for my userload. The Magic had 192MB of userland-accessible memory, my current Desire-phone has 150MB userland-accessible memory.

Both Magic and Desire has expandable storage by using a microSD memory card slot. Magic can handle cards of up to 16GB capacity and Desire can handle up to 32GB capacity. The only problem with external memory storage is read/write-times while using externally stored applications, which at times would entail a lot of loading-time when using data-heavy applications. Instead of just boosting and mostly utilizing the userland-accessible memory that is incorporated into the chipset.

With the Nexus S they have eliminated these problems as the userland-accessible memory is a 15GB iNAND-partition :D It really doesn't bother me that the memory is iNAND and that it doesn't sport a microSD slot, in my experience, phones and memory cards don't always work all that well together ( mostly because microSD cards doesn't handle rapid mounting/unmounting good at all in my experience ).

I'm looking forward to getting my new smart-phone, and can't wait to play with new features and functions :p

Addition, april 23rd:

I have now been tinkering with the Samsung Nexus S for a few days, and I am one happy techie :)

It is excactly like I imagined it to be by reading the published specs online. Allthough the user-land accessible memory-partition wasn't 15GB, it was more like 14GB. And with one 1GB user-land accessible system-partition to support the restricted 1GB nternal Android-system.

512MB of dedicated Mobile DDR with the PowerVR gpu really boosted the animation speed and look. Even the startup-logo is pure eye-candy :p Google-logo fading into a Nexus "X" symbol animated with colored spiral-lines, niiice! :)

I can even store all the games I've bought from Android-market without worrying about slowing the device down like I had to with the Desire. All apps are installed, all my games, utilities, etc. And I haven't even used one gigabyte completely yet :D

Yay! Woohoo! Awesomesauce! ^_^

Samsung + Android

http://www.digi.no/811832/avduket-ny-android-mobil

Samsung trapper nå opp med åpen kildekode og benytter Googles mobil-plattform "Android" slik som HTC har gjort med sine "Magic" og "Dream" modeller.

Personlig er jeg ikke noen stor fan av Samsungs mobil-produkter, men skal i dette tilfellet i alle fall teste 'duppeditten' for å få et skikkelig førsteinntrykk.

Slipp-dato sies å være en gang i september i år.

One thing I like about Android™

The developer's choice ;)

This is a compilation of videos of the Android developers, telling about their favourite functions in Android.

Nysatsingen på åpen kildekode

Da ser det ut som det blir Bergensområdet som først får benyttet alle de vidunderlige åpne kildekode-prosjektene som finnes rundt om i verden, i et offentlig samarbeid "for åpne standarder i offentlig sektor" (som ble nevnt tidligere i en-eller-annen artikkel/offentlig dokumentasjon).

Nytt kraftsenter på åpen kildekode - digi.no : Bedriftsteknologi

Bergen kommune, it-ekspertene Avenir, Høgskolen i Bergen (HiB), Universitetet i Bergen (UiB) og lokale it-miljøer går sammen for å gjøre Bergen til et kraftsenter for utnyttelse av åpen kildekode i utviklingen av fremtidens it-løsninger.

Initiativet understøtter både Regjeringens satsing på økt bruk av fri programvare og ønsket om styrket samhandling mellom offentlig og privat sektor.

Gartner spår at innen 2012 vil 80 prosent av alle it-løsninger inneholde elementer av åpen kildekode. De fastslår at virksomheter som velger å ignorere denne utviklingen, automatisk vil stille seg to skritt bak konkurrerende virksomheter.

Bergen Kommune, Avenir, HiB, UiB, og store lokale it-miljøer som DnB Nor, NextGenTel og EDB Business Partner ønsker å ligge i forkant i utnyttelsen av åpen kildekode.

Linux gets reseller friendly

SYNNEX, a leading software and hardware distributor (i.e. not a vendor), has partnered up with Red Hat and other open-source ISVs, to form the Open Source Channel Alliance. Is this the first step against getting Linux into more offices?

Computerworld Blogs

For VARs and integrators this means that they'll have a one-stop Web site and distributor to pick up Linux, and open-source content management systems, databases, business intelligence, network authentication, backup and recovery, e-mail, etc., etc., etc. For business users, especially those with small in-house IT staffs, this means they can just go to their local channel partner and get their pick of some of the top commercially-supported open-source programs.

I think this can be the beginning of something quite extraordinary ;)

"GhostNet" linked to the "Waledac" botnet

Conficker.C-infected computers have shown activity recently, according to security analysts and software/network engineers, so it seems the threat is not over...yet.

It's main activities (identified activities, that is), are:

• downloading (malware from other botnets, mainly the spammer-botnet "Waledac", better known as the re-animated Storm DeadNet "Valentines e-mail spammer botnet")
• linking (assumably to other malicious botnets)
  
• communicating (assumably with it's creators).

It is also reported to flash rogue anti-viral software ads directed at users of these infected machines.

Darknet.co.uk had this article to explain (excerpt from article below):

“Fear is used, universally, as a means to control people,” said Sendio CTO Tal Golan. “Governments use it. Large businesses use it. So it should come as no surprise to anyone that ‘cyber-bad guys’ use it.”

At the moment, the rogue anti-virus software comes from sites located in the Ukraine (131-3.elaninet.com.78.26.179.107) although the worm is downloading it from other sites, according to Kaspersky Lab.

Hmm. No, not surprising at all if you ask me.

Norsk - 60 Teraflop Switch

Norsk svitsj gir 60 teraflops på Blindern - digi.no : Bedriftsteknologi

Svitsjen utgjør hjertet i superdatamaskinen «Ranger» ved Texas Advanced Computing Center. Ranger kom på fjerde plass på Top500-listen allerede ett år etter lanseringen av Constellation 3456.

Slik ser Constellation ut før den koples til.



Slik ser den ut tilkoblet.

IBM kjøper teknologien som berget Apple

IBM kjøper teknologien som berget Apple - digi.no : Bedriftsteknologi

Det var Transitive-teknologi – kalt «QuickTransit» – som berget Apple da all Mac-programvare skulle overføres fra PowerPC-prosessoren til Intel-prosessorer.

Hmm, voldsomt så IBM kjøper opp for tiden? Vel, at IBM henvender seg til Apple av alle firmaer er jo noe ekstraordinært i seg selv (eller?).

Uansett, at IBM nå tar til seg kryssplattform-verktøy for å konvertere Linux/x86 kode, til Linux/PowerPC betyr i alle fall at de nå har muligheten til å oppskalere brukte plattformer/arkitekturer (bruke større dataanlegg, flere hard-prosesserende maskiner og/eller forskjellige/større systemer/anlegg, alt etter applikasjonshensiktene/brukerlasten i gjeldende firma) siden de nå kan kjøre samme kode overalt.

The "Big Blue Sun" ?

Well, the news about IBM and Sun Microsystems merging has slipped my attention.

But now that I'm aware, what will this mean to future Java / JavaScript development? Personally, I think(hope) that IBM will continue the open-source development and release of Java code.

JavaScript is basically public-domain, but changes aggressively every month/business-quarter. It is governed by the ECMA initiative (hence, is often referred to as "ECMAscript"
 in web-development communities).

http://www.javaworld.com/javaworld/jw-04-2009/jw-04-if-ibm-owns-java.html

Another article I found @ computerworld.com insisted IBM would commit to hold Java development under the supervision of the community, maybe under a revised community development group?

Anyway, as IBM has been a great contributor to OSS communities the last years (in contrast to Sun), I expect them to better handle Sun's main development products, or if not, their own Java implementation(s) (Apache Geronimo / Jakarta) will suffice (if not even exceed the optimal performance of Sun's implementation(s).., at least according to some web-developers/journalists and/or Java enthusiasts).

Computerworld.com link:
http://blogs.computerworld.com/good_bye_solaris_the_fate_of_suns_top_5_technologies

API / ABI / POSIX

API => Application Programming Interface

An application programming interface (API) is a set of routines, data structures, object classes and/or protocols provided by libraries and/or operating system services in order to support the building of applications.

The API itself is largely abstract in that it specifies an interface and controls the behavior of the objects specified in that interface. The software that provides the functionality described by an API is said to be an implementation of the API. An API is typically defined in terms of the programming language used to build an application. The related term, ABI (Application Binary Interface), is a lower level definition concerning details at the Assembly language level. For example, the Linux Standard Base is an ABI, while POSIX is an API.

POSIX => Portable Operating System Interface

The POSIX standard defines an API that allows a wide range of common computing functions to be written such that they may operate on many different systems (Mac OS X and various BSDs implement this interface); however, making use of this requires re-compilation for each platform.

Development & Simplicity

"everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler"
--Albert Einstein

"simplicity is the ultimate sophistication"
--Leonardo Da Vinci

"it seems that perfection is reached not when there is nothing left to add,
but when there is nothing left to take away"
--Antoine De Saint Exupéry

KISS => Keep It Simple Stupid !

OSS is getting international recognition

At least SOMEONE understands the new world of technology we're approaching. The British Minister for Digital Engagement (-Tom Watson-) released a new 'plan-of-action' yesterday, entitled: "Open Source, Open Standards and Re-Use: Government Action Plan".

(Click here for a PDF version of the paper.)

A little intro-excerpt:

"Open Source has been one of the most significant cultural developments in IT and beyond over the last two decades: it has shown that individuals, working together over the Internet, can create products that rival and sometimes beat those of giant corporations; it has shown how giant corporations themselves, and Governments, can become more innovative, more agile and more cost-effective by building on the fruits of community work; and from its IT base the Open Source movement has given leadership to new thinking about intellectual property rights and the availability of information for re-use by others."

The new action plan adds to the old plan published in 2004, but the new one includes circumstances and agreements that can make it difficult for proprietary software vendors to compete in government IT deployment.

He states among a lot of things that the new era in IT development demands re-usage of code. (Securing government rights to special custom code and re-usage of the code within internal departments.)

So, basically, it looks very promising for OSS in the time to come regarding government software deployment, software costs and national IT system expansion.

January 22. - remember this date fellow geeks!

This article @ computerworld.com, discusses and reflects on the software giants vs. open-source. It describes what situation the IT industry is facing taking the financial crisis into consideration.

http://blogs.computerworld.com/being_anti_linux_is_bad_for_your_business_health

Slackware-Current

Allright.
First off, this is my server/multimedia-top/desktop machine. I've been running Slackware Linux on it since revision bump 10.0. Lately I was running a heavily modified v12.1, with a custom HIDS and firewall automation solution. But with all my modifications/addons to the GUI, it was slowing down... massively. I was also experiencing kernel oops concerning OpenGL on quite a few applications as well.

Then again, the machine sports the following specs:
AMD Athlon 1.8GHz, 1.1GB RAM, nVidia GeForce 6600 GT 128MB AGP8x

To put it bluntly; I was getting tired, So I decided to upgrade it all to the ever-feared slackware-current branch. Which, in my opinion wasn't that hard a task at all. I just rsynced the current-directory on a close mirror, read the 'UPGRADE.TXT', and went along with the upgrade procedure.

I am now sitting and writing this post on my newly fresh installed Slackware-Current environment ( codenamed '12.2 RC1', it even has the '12.2' insignia in some configuration files in the /etc directory already ). Anyway, the screenshot is of my low-contrast themed KDE-4.1 desktop running Plasma desktop effects, and the background is called 'vanilla standard slackware-logo', an svg-file I made a while ago.

OSS participation!

A 30-page ebook on how to participate in the Open Source community; whom to talk to, where to go for info, etc. =) A recent addition to open source development, following the beta release of the brilliant testing program 'AppChecker'.

http://ldn.linuxfoundation.org/

Application checker

AppCheck is a testing-application for programs made for linux to check for cross-system portability. AppCheck tests the ELFs, scripts, libraries and more. As a testing framework, it doesn't seem to differentiate itself much from the forerunner of all checking programs: lint. The first program to flag suspicious and non-portable contructs, first appeared in System V Unix version 7 (outside of Bell Labs) in 1979.

But it's what AppCheck does after these checks that makes it stand out. It checks all the components of the program against the Linux Standard Base, AND different distributions listed in the LSB Database. It then displays all of this information on a webpage to make the report more intuitive and structured, and even gives you the opportunity to submit the program directly from the test-program for LSB certification!

After reading about this wonderful piece of software, I was inspired to do more C/C++ programming in my spare time, since AppCheck will spare me a lot of time when it comes to testing.

AppCheck is in no way a perfect checker, it's still in beta, and it cannot check libraries, binaries, and other components that aren't listed in the LSB. But it is a significant step forward for portability development.

** Note however that AppCheck is in no way a debugger **

http://www.linux.com/feature/144170